The UN has found that current policies violate both a UN convention and UK legislation. There is little hope for change when the government simply denies it

Like a lot of other disabled people, I’ve been eagerly following the progress of the United Nations’ inspection into the UK’s record on disability rights. Last month in Geneva, a UK delegation faced questioning by a UN committee based on 2,000 pages of evidence gathered during the course of its inquiry. The UN’s final report, published on Thursday, as widely expected, is a 17-page-long catalogue of shame, and highly critical of the UK’s record on almost every area covered by the UN convention on the rights of persons with disabilities (CRPD).

read the rest of this article by Mike Lambert in the GUardian here: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/sep/04/austerity-disabled-people-rights-uk-un-government

Tories accused of being ‘arrogant’ and in ‘confused denial’ about the impact of austerity cuts.

A major new report from The Centre for Welfare Reform argues that the UK is tipping backwards to an era of institutionalisation, and of disregard for the human rights and basic dignity of people with learning disabilities.

The report ‘Back to Bedlam‘, written by the distinguished academic and researcher Robin Jackson, warns that decades of progress in advancing disability and human rights is now in reverse, blaming years of austerity and cuts in welfare support.

The report also argues that policies have been imposed without any significant accountability or discussion, adding that many of these decisions mean the UK is now in breach of international standards.

The United Nations (UN) committee that found the UK government guilty of violating the UN disability convention has revealed for the first time that its breaches of the human rights treaty were both “grave” and “systematic”.

The decision to clarify the seriousness of the UK’s breaches of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) shows for the first time just how seriously the committee viewed those violations.

The government has been criticised by the UK’s human rights watchdog over its record on protecting the rights of disabled people, for the second time in just 12 days.

Last week, Disability News Service revealed how the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) had been snubbed by the minister for disabled people after raising serious concerns about her government’s response to a report that found it guilty of “grave or systematic” violations of the UN disability convention